


Meraki

by secretsidgenowriter



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Hockey Robot Sid, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 16:42:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20312707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/secretsidgenowriter/pseuds/secretsidgenowriter
Summary: Meraki- (V.) to do something with soul, creativity or love; to put something of yourself in your work.





	Meraki

Zhenya is going to need a stronger cup of tea if he’s going to make it through the day. The one in his hand just isn’t going to cut it.

He yawns, wide enough for his jaw to crack and ache as he takes the escalator down into the bowels of the facility. He takes another sip of his tea and drags his free hand along the side of the stone as the escalator brings him down. By now he knows every peak and valley of the rock as his fingertips move across it. It’s more familiar than the walls of his own home.

It’s a depressing thought, that he spends so much of his time underground in secret but his work is important and someday it will all be worth it.

He nods to the guards and flashes his badge as he steps off the escalator. They nod back and don’t look at him any further, their eyes scanning the vast nothingness of the cavern in front of them. Zhenya hardly sees the point of them. It’s not as if anyone can find this place–it’s a series of twisting hallways and door after door of fingerprint scanners and retina scanners to get here. It’s not something you accidentally stumble upon.

But, if the government wants to spend their money on pointless guards he supposes that’s up to them. As long as they keep funding the project and keep signing Zhenya’s checks he’s not going to complain.

Zhenya’s footsteps echo around the chamber as he makes his way toward one of the narrow hallways that leads to his office.

Unsurprisingly, Sergei is already there, sitting at his desk and alternating back and forth between typing on his computer and furiously scribbling in his notebook. It makes Zhenya’s hands cramp just to look at him.

“It’s nice of you to finally join me,” Sergei says and Zhenya rolls his eyes and slips his scarf off from around his neck. He hangs it and his coat on the hook by the door.

“I’m five minutes late.”

“Ten,” Sergei shoots back. “Find yourself a new watch.”

“My birthday was only a few months ago. You should have gotten one for me.”

Now it’s Sergei’s turn to roll his eyes and Zhenya grins.

“How is Sid this morning?”

“Do you mean Test Subject 87,” Sergei asks. “I wouldn’t know. I haven’t woken him yet.”

Zhenya frowns and actually does check his watch. “Why not?”

“I was waiting for you.”

“You are allowed to speak to him, you know. I think he might like to speak to someone new once in a while.”

“He likes what we tell him to like,” Sergei points out. “Right now you are all he knows.”

“Yes but eventually-.”

“Zhenya, please,” Sergei interrupts. “Just go wake him.”

Sergei goes back to his computer, ending the conversation and Zhenya shakes his head and pushes through the door leading into the holding area.

He finds Sid exactly how he left him last night, lying on a cot in the far corner of the room eyelashes fanned out against his pale cheeks and his bee-stung lips just barely parted.

He looks unreal. Too good to be true. But then again, that’s the idea.

Zhenya kneels down and peels back the strip of artificial skin at the base of Sid’s neck and flips the switch. There’s a quiet hum as Sid starts to power up. His fingers twitch at his sides and he takes his first breath and then, his eyes open. They cycle through colors–red, blue, green, and yellow. Then they flash gold before they settle on hazel, a color that took entirely too long for Zhenya and Sergei to agree on.

Sid’s head turns and when he focuses on Zhenya his lips pull up into a smile.

Zhenya smiles back and moves out of the way so Sid can sit up.

“Hello, Sid,” Zhenya says, switching to English so Sid can understand. “How are you this morning?”

“I’m fine. How are you,” he asks, polite as always.

“Oh, fine,” Zhenya says with a weary sigh and Sid’s eyebrows furrow.

“It something wrong,” he asks, “your face looks like…” he pulls an exaggerated frown and Zhenya has to smile. Sid’s far too perceptive. It’s a good quality for a captain to have but out of that context it can be a little much. Maybe Zhenya should ask Sergei to turn that trait down.

“Is early,” Zhenya explains with an easy shrug, “I’m tired, tea is not great this morning and Sergei is douche.”

There’s tapping on the two-way mirror behind them and without turning around Zhenya raises his hand and sticks up his middle finger.

Sid watches for a moment then copies him and Zhenya laughs, mood immediately elevating.

“Yes, very good, Sid.”

Sid smiles back then stands. “Are we going to play hockey today?”

Zhenya’s smile falters. “I think so, maybe. Have to run some test firsts, okay?”

Sid nods. He hasn’t been programmed to argue yet.

“Be right back, Sid,” Zhenya tells him and Sid nods again and sits back down.

“You’re teaching him bad habits,” Sergei tells him when Zhenya steps back through the door into the office.

“Someone has to. You can’t let him be a pushover. He has to have some fight. He’ll be a target. Guys will run right over him.”

“What does it matter,” Sergei asks, “it’s not as though he can be hurt.”

Zhenya immediately bristles. He hates the thought of Sid being shoved into the boards or shoved down onto the ice even though he knows Sergei is correct. He wouldn’t be harmed. He would pop right back up and continue on with the play as if nothing had happened.

He will play every game. He’ll never get tired. He’ll score more goals, rack up more assists, win more awards than anyone else in history.

He’ll be the best because they will program him to be the best.

“I want to get him on the ice today,” Zhenya says and Sergei’s lips press into a thin line. “He wants to get on the ice.”

“He doesn’t want anything,” Sergei explains slowly. “He can’t want. Do you understand that.”

“Yes, of course,” Zhenya says with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You know what I meant.”

Sergei narrows his eyes. “Do I?”

Zhenya chooses to ignore him. Instead, he sits down heavily in his chair and turns on his computer.

When Zhenya first heard of the project, through a series of backchannel meetings and encrypted emails, he jumped at the chance to join the team.

Using the same Super Soldier programs that were used in the Cold War and tweaking them to create the worlds greatest hockey player to infiltrate the NHL was a opportunity too great for Zhenya to pass up.

He was given top level security clearance and paired up with Sergei Gonchar, whose reputation for calm, level headedness preceded him, and together they started to build the perfect hockey player.

They took every single feature into account.

What he would sound like- Canadian to appease the old-boys club at the heart of the NHL.

The way his body looked- shorter than most other hockey players so his center of gravity was lower.

His personality- carefully bland. He would say a lot without ever really saying anything at all. He’d be polite, charitable, a PR dream come true.

Zhenya and Sergei built the bare bones of the ideal hockey player over and over again. Crashing and burning and succeeding in equal measures along the way.

They created 86 prototypes before they settled on the one they were happiest with: the 87th. Who Zhenya named Sid.

Sid is smart and strong. He’s relentless on the puck and can see the ice better than anyone else. He knows what the defense and the goalie are going to do before they even know and he can score from impossible angles.

But he’s also humble and kind. He’ll take rookies under his wings and he’ll make any team he’s on a family.

And the way he looks…Sergei always said Zhenya spent far too much time on the way Sid looks.

“Have you seen a hockey player,” Sergei had asked as Zhenya worked with a delicate hand to make Sid’s hair darker and his lips plusher. “Have you ever seen a human? They don’t look like this. Pick one feature and stick with it.”

Zhenya had simply hummed and made Sid’s eyes just a tad brighter.

Sergei had thrown up his hands and Zhenya hadn’t bothered to hide his laugh.

Sid is handsome and talented and kind. He is everything anyone would ever want a hockey player to be.

In hindsight, Zhenya understands Sergei’s concern.

Seeing Sid out on the ice is nothing short of unbelievable. Zhenya likes to think he can keep up with most hockey players but when it’s only him and Sid out there he has to stand back and watch in awe.

Sid whips the puck back to Zhenya from across the ice. It’s a perfect pass, tape to tape, and even though Zhenya hadn’t been expecting it it’s no problem at all for him to corral it. Sid makes everyone on the ice with him better. There was no programming for that.

“Nice pass,” he tells Sid as Sid skates a slow circle around him. They’ve been on the ice for hours now and Zhenya’s legs feel like they’re going to give out.

Sid never tires.

“Have to sit,” Zhenya tells him and Sid nods as they both skate over to the bench. Zhenya plops down and Sid bats the puck back and forth to himself. Zhenya watches his laser focus on the puck for a moment then asks “do you like this?”

Sid looks up, the puck is still bouncing on the blade of his stick. “I love hockey.”

“But do you know what that means,” Zhenya counters and he can almost hear Sergei’s voice telling him that he’s pushing this too far. He’s just asking for trouble. “Do you know what love is?”

“I only know what you tell me to know,” Sid says. They told him that he loved hockey but they never explained what it meant.

“Love is a feeling,” Zhenya begins. “It’s this feeling that you have in your heart.”

“I don’t have one of those,” Sid points out. It’s true. Beneath his chest lie only wires and cables and an advanced control panel.

“No,” Zhenya says slowly as he pushes himself back up to his feet. “I guess you don’t. C’mon now, ten more minutes.”

“Twenty,” Sid counters.

“Fifteen. Anymore and you kill me.”

“I would never,” Sid says as he skates away with the puck.

Zhenya knows that’s true. He was never programmed to kill.

“What’s going to happen to me?”

Zhenya looks over Sid’s shoulder and catches both their reflections in the mirror in front of them. Sid’s back is opened wide and Zhenya has spent the better part of an hour poking and prodding at the wires looking for the short circuit that’s preventing Sid from scoring on his backhand.

Sid has been patient and quiet up until now.

Zhenya looks down at the wires in front of him. “Fix circuit and you score again,” Zhenya says. “Easy.”

“No, I mean after. After you decide that I’m perfect. What happens then?”

“Then you play hockey.”

“In America?”

Zhenya nods. “Or Canada. Depends on what team gets you.”

“Will you come with?”

Zhenya looks back up at the mirror. Sid is looking down at his hands where they’re folded in his lap.

“No. I’ll stay here.” He and Sergei will be busy working on replicating the results they found with Sid into another hockey player. “You’ll be taken care of. You won’t be alone.”

There will be handlers sent along with him. Someone will be posing as his manager. An older couple will be going along as his parents. It’s possible that they get him someone to play his girlfriend. They’ll all tag along on the journey stateside. They’ll all be able to help if something like this happens. If wires get crossed and he’s not performing up to his very high standard.

“But you won’t be there,” Sid asks again and Zhenya stares at the defeated slope of Sid’s shoulders in front of him.

“No. Have to stay here.”

Sid sighs and hunches forward. “Can we do this later,” he asks and Zhenya pulls his hands back.

“But your backhand.”

“It’s fine,” Sid says quietly. “I’m not skating right now so it’s okay.”

Zhenya stares at their reflection for a moment before he closes up the back panel and stands.

“I’ll be back,” he says, “to check on you.”

Sid nods, the motion barely visible before he leans back against the cot and looks up at the ceiling.

Back in the office Sergei is frowning at the glass.

“We’ll have to change something. His commitment level maybe. We can’t have him settling like that or putting things off.”

“Leave him,” Zhenya says. “He’s sad.”

Sergei heaves a sigh. “He doesn’t know what sadness is.”

“Look at him,” Zhenya shouts. Sid is curled up on the cot facing away from the mirror. “He’s lonely. He’s upset and you want to change him instead of help him? You treat him like he’s an—.”

“Experiment,” Sergei finishes. “Because that’s what he is. That’s exactly what he is. You’re too close to this, Zhenya,” he says with a shake of his head. “I knew it was a mistake to let you design him.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“This crush,” Sergei says, “these feelings you have for him. It can’t go on. It should never have started. He can never feel the same way about you as you do about him. I’ve let it go on for too long. I’m thinking about asking you to be removed from this project.”

“Sergei-.”

“If something happened and we had to disassemble him and start over, could you? If the project was suddenly scrapped and he was torn apart and used for…I don’t know…spare parts for a television set or a computer, could you allow that to happen? Could you be the one to do it?”

Zhenya says nothing, just looks down at his feet.

“I didn’t think so,” Sergei says softly. “This will be for your own good, really. I know it doesn’t seem that way now but in the long run…you might even thank me.”

Zhenya seriously doubts that. Losing both Sid and the job he’s been devoting his life to in one blow doesn’t ever seem like something he’ll appreciate.

Zhenya mopes through the rest of the day. He goes over programming, writing and rewriting codes. It’s mindless work for him, the kind that he could do in his sleep but it passes the time and before he knows it Sergei is packing up his things and is ready to leave for the day.

Zhenya jerks his head up and looks out the two way mirror. Sid’s exactly where he left him hours ago.

“I’m going to go,” Sergei tells him. “Maybe you should take some time to say your goodbyes. Tomorrow is a new day, Zhenya. It might be better.”

Zhenya waits for the door to shut softly behind Sergei before he pushes himself out of his chair and enters Sid’s room.

Sid doesn’t stir, not even when Zhenya says his name. He thinks that maybe Sid’s has slipped into auto sleep and there’s something wrong with his programming that he doesn’t wake when he hears his name. Zhenya reaches out and touches his shoulder and Sid jumps beneath his hand.

“Sorry,” Zhenya says as Sid flips over onto his back. “Didn’t mean to surprise.”

He steps back so Sid can throw his legs over the side of the cot and sit up.

“Sid,” he starts but Sid’s quick to interrupt.

“I don’t want to go. Not without you. I know you don’t think that I can want because that’s not how I’m programmed but—.”

Zhenya drops to his knees in front of Sid and presses their mouths together.

Sid’s lips are cool and dry and he has no idea what to do or even what a kiss is but when Zhenya pulls back, Sid reaches for him.

“We could go,” Zhenya tells him. It won’t be easy. He’ll have to take out the GPS that they embedded in Sid’s operating system and getting past the guards that keep post 24/7 won’t be easy but it won’t be impossible. They already have papers drawn up for him. An ID and a passport. They could do it. They could try. Zhenya would find a way. “We could get away from from here.”

“But what about hockey,” Sid asks and Zhenya takes a deep breath.

“It wouldn’t be the NHL. Wouldn’t be professional but you could still skate. We could find somewhere with a pond that would freeze over in the winter.”

“Just the winter,” Sid asks and Zhenya nods.

“Hockey won’t be whole life. Have to find other things.”

Sid leans forward and presses their foreheads together. Zhenya links his fingers through Sid’s.

“Other things,” Sid asks, like he can’t comprehend there being anything else.

“World is so big, Sid. Have no idea. There are books and movies and different foods. We can travel when things calm down. There is so much out there to see.”

“Together,” Sid asks and Geno nods and brings Sid’s hands up to his mouth. He presses a kiss to his knuckles.

“Of course,” he says, “together.”


End file.
